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Writer's Surgery

On Showing Up

Like everything in life (well, most things) writing is dependent on showing up. If you don’t sit down (or stand) and open your computer (or notepad or whatever) and write, you don’t get words on the page. And if you don’t have words on a page you don’t have stories.

Sometimes those words come easier than others but the truth is it’s almost impossible to tell which ones came easier (easier isn’t necessarily better). Sometimes the words come very slowly, or very quickly. But, if you don’t show up, they don’t show up.

Of course writing isn’t just about one thing, there’s that whole craft side of stuff, and there’s that whole life side of stuff that can be anti-the-showing-of-the-up. But if you can manage the showing up more frequently than the not, and you combine it with a decent period of time, the words will come, and where you put them will be more interesting (or less, there’s no guarantees, but you can hope it will be more interesting).

Ideas are the simple part, it’s the showing up that’s harder, and the more you show up the easier it is.